Heritage leader skeptical about new war in Karabakh

PanARMENIAN.Net - Armenia has to alter its concept of Karabakh conflict settlement, Heritage parliamentary group leader said, commenting on recent Kazan-hosted meeting of Armenian, Russian and Azerbaijani presidents.

“Slight increase of pressure or creation of a deadlock situation for the negotiating parties would eliminate possibilities for maneuvering,” Stepan Safaryan told a news conference in Yerevan.

As he noted in this connection, “Azerbaijan was named responsible for a failure to sign a document in Kazan.”

Safaryan was skeptical about the possibility of a resumption of a war in Karabakh, however, warning Armenia against losing vigilance.

The summit between Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia in Kazan on June 24 completed without an agreement on basic principles of Nagorno Karabakh conflict settlement. “The countries’ leaders registered mutual understanding on a range of problems, the resolution of which boosts creation of conditions for approving main principles. The meeting participants considered the course of works carried out with the aim of coordination of the project with basic principles,” according to the statement. The Presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan expressed gratitude to the Russian, French and U.S. leaders, the OSCE Minsk group co-chairs, for ‘their constant attention to Nagorno-Karabakh problem’ and highly praised personal efforts of the Russian President in support of agreements.

Later on Minister of Foreign Affairs Edward Nalbandian noted that the June 24 meeting was not a breakthrough, as Azerbaijan proved unready to accept the final version of the basic principles suggested by the OSCE Minsk Group Co-chairs. Instead, the Azerbaijani leader attempted to impose 10 new proposals, thus precluding the possibility of any agreement on the issue,” he added.